Somebody that I used to know
by ZeroGoa
Summary: What would you do to recover a precious person to you? Join Hermione in her travel to the dark path, when you have nothing to lose rules are just a suggestion to follow. Epilogue complain, Dark Hermione, PTSD, Suicide, Harmony of course. Give it a try and hope you like it.
1. The Aftermath

Chapter 1: Aftermath

Almost a year had passed since the Battle of Hogwarts, magical society where desperately trying to rebuild what was left, even then peace seemed as an unreachable treasure, from time to time you could hear stories about rising death eaters cells attacking random people, and a Pureblood political movement that every day increased in power and influence, they said that the rising of Lord Voldemort was a consequence of giving the Muggle-borns and Half-bloods too many freedoms, and people believed in them because… well, because people were stupid and preferred to believe that someone else was guilty of their own sins.

This was what a young man scarred by the war think every now and then, people of the so-called "light" side looked at him as some kind of Messiah, the beacon of a new hope, with his friends as his apostles, how they could go on with their lives? How could they have so many hopes? How could they live? Ron just loved to be the center of everyone attention, a war hero and one of the youngest Aurors in history, Hermione didn´t like the fame but was making political profit with it, working for the DMLE and representing Harry in the Wizengamot, or better said, using the House of Potter and Black to stop the purebloods crazy attempts.

And there was Ginny, he knew she was deeply hurt by the loss of her family, and that her hopes to form a family with him were just an attempt to go on with their lives, but he couldn't, he was so broken, broken beyond repair. He was The Man-Who- Conquered, defeated fate and came victorious from the dead and prophecies, but what was he expected to do now?

War took everything from him, happiness, family, love… Yes, love, how many times he had tried to stop this feeling for her? How many times had he renounced the hope of someday be happy by her side? How many times had he sworn in vain that he seemed her just as a sister? But he was always late… First Krum and the damned yule ball, why he was so thick? She was the only woman in the whole Hogwarts he cared about and who he trusted and was comfortable, but no… you don't invite your sister to a dance, right? And then there was Ron, he couldn't take away from him the woman he loved, and even with the fights, she was happy right? When he was alone with her in the forest, running away, deep inside a dark voice that was his own hoped that it never ended, that someday she could see his feelings, that she could realize that Ginny was just a scape to not be the third wheel between his Friends…

But it was late, it was always late, he knew about their Kiss in the battle, and now they were engaged, he couldn't be such a git…

But nightmares didn't stop, voices screaming that it was all his fault, bloody corpses trying to drag him into darkness, and when he awoke alone in the middle of the night and remembered that the only woman who could stop the dreams was with another man, he hoped that those damned corpses would finish their work.

He barely got out from Grimmauld Place, first weeks there were too many funerals and ceremonies, then he just lost interest in the world, people didn´t understand why their saviour was like this, always with a sad gaze and a half smile, why he wasn´t happy, but even if he wanted to explain his reasons he couldn´t, he couldn't say aloud that he fought for a better world for the people he loved, for the woman he loved, but now he had lost purpose.

So, one night he prepared everything, took his wand and pointed it to his chest, to the witness if there was any a sickly Green light glow inside Grimmauld place, and then there was just silence…

 **I'm a huge Harmonie stories fan, and as you can guess this is my first attempt to write one, or better said, the first one I dare to publish, comments are welcome, I hope you enjoyed reading it, is just the beginning!**


	2. Unsaid

Chapter 2: Unsaid

The next morning a worried Hermione Granger had to blast the door of Grimmauld place only to find inside the lifeless body of his friend, she was speechless, her logical mind couldn´t understand the scene in front of her, What happened? A Death Eater attack? Harry promised to help her with a research for a Wizengamot meeting, she got worried when he never came to her office. No, there were no signs of a fight, but Harry had his wand in hand, and when she called Kreacher he never came to her, a thousand of possibilities run wild in her mind until she found a bunch of sealed letters on the dinner table, and she knew…

She had been so blind, but they were supposed to be happy right? He had been happy, hasn't he? The answer was obvious, tears filled her eyes, she didn´t have the strength to summon a Patronus, all she could do was to use the flu to call her fiance, half an hour later Grimmauld was full of shocked people with no answer for what had happened.

Everyone admitted that Harry never adjusted to his new life, but to commit suicide? Half of them still believed that everything was a scheme of death eaters, but it was a nonsense if someone had killed The Man-Who-Conquered obviously they would want the credit.

Hermione was alone in Harry's Room, she didn't want to hear anyone, not even Ron, all her fears had come to reality, she remembered the emptiness when Hagrid came with the body of Harry in his arms during the final battle, she remembered how she pleaded to heavens that he wasn't dead, to exchange his life for hers, and a miracle he raised again to bring an end to the war.

But now there was no hope, Harry was gone, for real this time, and looking at his empty room she started to understand how deeply hurt he had felt… the broken mirror that Sirius gave him was near the album with photos of his parents, the empty cage of Hedwig, a silly magical device that the twins had gifted to him, letters from Remus and Tonks…

Guilt, what killed Harry was guilt, survivor guilt to be precise, he would never ask for help, always feeling that he didn't deserve anything good in his life, good one Dumbledore, preparing the kid to die but not to deal with life.

A Weak voice called her bringing her back to reality

"Hermione?"

It was Ron...

"Hermione, there is a letter for you, do you want me to bring it to you?"

"No, thank you Ron… just give me a moment…" She cleaned the tears in her cheeks…

Downstairs Molly gave her a letter, with her name written in a familiar calligraphy, she didn't want to read it in front of everyone, so she got into the library alone and locked the door, carefully, as if she expected to suddenly awake from a bad dream, she broke the seal and started to read the parchment in front of her…

"Dear Hermione,

I could give you a ton of excuses and reasons for what I did, but I know it won't work with you, so I will trust you, and tell you the truth.

Hermione, I'm tired, I used to think that if I defeated Voldemort finally I could have a normal life, I knew it wouldn't be easy, but I hoped and failed once again. Life doesn't come easy to us, right? people see me as a hero, but I never asked for it, I never asked to be a leader, to be what Dumbledore used to be… I'm weak I know, but really, I can't take it anymore.

Before saying goodbye I want you to know one thing, I love you, Hermione, and I care for you, Ron makes you happy and even if I don't quite understand you both and all the fights, I really hope for your happiness, and that's what I'm looking for, my own happiness, or at least a peaceful place…

Farewell Hermione, Maybe in another time everything could have been different.

Yours, Harry."

She cried, she had failed, years helping and protecting Harry and, in the end, she couldn't make him happy, she couldn´t protect him from the darkness of his own heart, she loved him so much that she didn't care if he loved her just as a sister, just being by his side was enough, and now he was gone. When she got out the Aurors had already taken the body of Harry to San Mungo's, Wizards didn´t practice autopsies from what she learned but it was needed to certify the death of her friend, still then the living room was full of people, Weasleys, Neville and even Luna, Shacklebolt with some people she knew from DMLE.

All of them had nice words of comfort, but no one could understand Harry's reasons, she tried, but her brain refused to work, again and again, she wished it was all a dream, or nightmare, hoping to awake by the end of the night.

But it wasn't, and the next morning Harry was still dead, and the world seemed darker and hopeless for her.

 **As you can guess English is not my maternal language, so short chapters work the best for me. Excuses aside I hope you enjoyed reading this second chapter.**


	3. Will - Grief

Will

From the day Harry died Hermione lost track of time, everything was so fast and slow at the same time, one morning there was the funeral of Harry, Magical Britain took it hard the death of their savior, then she didn't remember how many eternal nights she cried alone in her flat, not talking to anyone, She just wished Harry was there, that she could help him to repair every crack in his heart, Logic failed her time and time again, she lost herself… A pair of weeks later there was a reunion in Grimmauld Place to read Harry's Will.

"Now that Miss Granger is here we can start with the Reading of the will… Please miss take a seat..." said the Goblin when he noticed her.

She took a seat near a bookshelf, away from everyone else.

"Last Will of Harry James Potter…" started the Goblin

"I, Harry James Potter, Lord of Potter and Black Ancient Houses in full health, sanity, and use of magic, in case of death it's my will that my properties be divided as I say,

For Neville Longbottom…"

Hermione was lost in her thoughts again, she didn´t have to put attention to know how Harry divided the money, generous sums for everyone and even more generous to Weasley Family… meaningful gifts for each one of his Friends, a good sum to assure Teddy's future… and then her name was called,

"… and for Hermione Granger, my dear friend, you know I would have died a thousand times without you right? But is not for that I will eternally be in debt with you, people say I was brave all these years, but in fact I was terrified, doomed by a prophecy, that's not courage, is just resignment, but you… sacrificed more than you should, more than I would ever have the right to ask… I name you the Head of Potter and Black Ancient Houses and also the library of Potter and Black Families is now under your care, I think you may find it interesting, of course until Teddy can take his place as Head of Black Family, if someone can make good use of this is you, I wish I had helped to find your parents, I know this will not repair any damage done, but I give you 50 thousand gallons so you can find your parents and seek any path in your life you want…. I love you Hermione, Thanks for giving your friendship to me all these years."

She didn't care for the money, and now without Harry, Wizengamot, Britain itself, could go to hell, stupid Harry, He left her alone.

Grief

Days became weeks, and then months, and Hermione Granger still felt the pain as if Harry had died yesterday, she kept going with her routine, in a mechanical way, she shut down herself from the rest of the world, engagement with Ron was history, she thought he would understand, how could he cope so easily with the suicide of Harry? One night he bitterly blamed her for the little time they passed together, he was right, she knew it, but also came to a harsh truth…

"Hermione, do you really think Harry would want this for you? For us?"

"I don't know what would He want because He is dead Ronald! Dead! You bloody Git! Or you don't feel anything?! I lost a brother! My only family left!"

"We are alive, He is not Hermione"

Ron barely managed to evade the _Reducto_ Hermione shot to him, the spell hit the Wall making a hole through it, He couldn't believe it, not even in their more violent fights she had tried to really hurt him, a hex maybe, like that time with those bloody birds… But this?

Before getting out of her flat he just said one final thing…

"I lost a brother to that night Hermione, believe me, I know the pain of losing family, but even then, I can only think if you would act the same if I had died instead of Harry…"

That was the last day they talked, actually from that day she didn't talk to anyone else, only when it was strictly necessary and always in a blunt tone, normally it happened when people tried to help her, she was pale and thin, barely eating and sleeping the necessary to survive, Luna, Ginny, even Molly tried to talk to her, but they didn't understand her pain, even she had to admit that sometimes she didn't understand her own feelings, a mix of guilt and sadness had torn apart her soul.

In the darkness of the night, the only wish in her soul was that she could bring Harry back, until one day she thought "Why not?" She was the most brilliant witch of her age, right? She would bring Harry back in some way or another, she would conquer where Voldemort and the legends had failed, she would conquer Death.

 **Hi again! thanks for the comments, I really appreciate them, so, as you can see this were originally two separate and really short chapters, so for now I think for now is for the best if they work as one until I can work more on them. Hope you like them, wait soon for the fourth and fifth chapter, is not like I write quick, to be honest I already had them, after that the uploads will be slower but I hope not much. Anyway, do you like it? I have been trying to get into the mood of how someone gets into the dark arts to find answers that the light doesn´t have.**


	4. The Abyss will see you

Chapter 5: The Abyss will see you

Michael, Mich for those few that still acknowledged him as a friend, was waiting in his usual spot at one of the nameless taverns of Knockturn Alley, one of those places where you could find the worst that the wizarding society had to offer, but also a place where you could get useful information with the right questions and incentive. He was a muggle born, almost a year had passed since the battle of Hogwarts and the rise and fall of the more zealot blood purist movement, fortunately for him when all the craziness was at its peak he was far way serving the final years of his first and only period in the Foreign Legion, his family, while he cared for them, little by little had casted him out as a black sheep, or was the other way around? It didn´t matter, they lived in two different worlds, and his one or two visits a year were enough for them, so they were at no more risk of death eaters that to suffer an attack from IRA.

Why he joined a muggle army then? "Isis", one of the girls he met in the office asked once, well that was an easy answer, Pure-bloods had the final word if you wanted to find a good job, even in the Auror ranks there was a little disdain as Muggle-borns were not familiar with the more hardwired traditions and culture, worst, some even believed that muggles lived in Victorian times, like if little had been done since the XIX century, so to make some money and live in his own terms he joined the only place where his birth status or even his name didn´t matter to anyone.

Life as mercenary was not easy, far from it, 5 years in the Legion starting from his training had been the more painful emotionally and physically for him, he was never a deeply religious person, but he had gone to wars and conflicts around the world, only to be witness of hell in earth, people killing each other's for purposes that sometimes no one really understood, he served as infantry, let others join to the flashy special operations squads, it was his personal pride to be one of the first to enter and last to go from battlefield, he killed with no joy, it was necessary for his own survival, and of course, magic came useful many times, he didn´t have any course or knowledge of advanced magic, just the school repertory, but even a simple repairing spell was worth gold in the middle of battle, also he discovered something, he was really good at silent and wandless magic, is not that he trained for it, or that he was a genius, it was more like an accident, but may be the trick was to be in such a danger and near death that magic started to respond to your own instincts and intend, who knew? Maybe someday he would research about it, to this day he only used his wand to cast the more tricky or difficult spells, or when he wanted to keep a low profile.

And here he was, waiting for something to happen, the investigation had been going on for almost a month, it started with rumors of some really dark and dangerous tomes being sold on the black market, Magical Britain society liked to live as if with the death of Voldemort all the problems had been solved and there were no more dark arts practitioners, but magic was all about power and knowledge, and the more ambitious and devious ones will always look into the darkness for answers that the light didn´t have, danger never ceased to exist, it only changed his mask, the Devil had always his way.

It was almost midnight and he was getting nervous, his contact, an old foreign scholar specialized in some questionable branches of magic, had promised to be there at eleven o´clock, while he cast a quick _Tempus_ he got Goosebumps, he felt as he had returned to combat, something was wrong, he could feel danger lurking in darkness, may be his charade had blown up, or may be something else, but he trusted his instinct and in silence he got up and left some sickles in the table, quickly as possible without getting attention he got outside and walked to the safety of Diagon Alley, in the first chance he got into a deserted street and disillusioned himself, he waited ready for anything that was coming towards him, just few moments afterward three men came in the same street, it appeared as they were only common drunks getting back to home, but he knew the truth, they were looking for him, he could tell they were professionals, keeping a combat formation even with the drunk act, and their wands ready in hands, may be Aurors? Maybe it was just paranoia, but better safe than sorry, he used the portkey hidden in his wallet, a simple black business card, and with an almost silent plop he got the hell out of there.

Back in the Department of Mysteries he wrote a codified report for his Handler, he was thinking about tonight, it was a failure, of course, but from another perspective he had confirmed that they weren´t the only ones interested in the rumors about "Hades", It was the code name for a mysterious buyer that had been asking around for some very dangerous and rare necromantic materials, artifacts and tomes that gave shivers even to the more seasoned scholars of the department, he only could guess why someone would want them.

 **Hi Again! Ok, this was a tricky chapter for me, in fact, it started as an idea for another story, but I wanted to give Hermione a kind of antagonist, or at least someone neutral to her position, so I don´t know if it will work out and if not I just will delete this. So hope you like it and would love to read your opinion.**


	5. Rituals

Chapter 5: Rituals

After few weeks locked up in her flat with the Potter and Black libraries at her disposal in two special library trunks Hermione discovered some interesting facts about magic, first there where a noticeable difference in the conception of the nature of magical power between "old" magic and "modern" one, the key concept was that before the invention of wands wizards depended on rituals, a more primal, powerful and complicated way to cast magic, but this kind of knowledge was kept secure inside families and tribes, so there were too many of them even if they had the same purpose in nature, you could find some for healing, others to kill your enemies, and so on, also they were imbued with a religious vibe, rituals were a pledge to the gods for miracles, some wizard historians even believed that this was the reason for the foundation of religions, in the older days wizards and muggles lived together as one, and what couldn´t been explained was a miracle for ones and magic for others, a gift from the heavens, and a curse from hell in some cases.

The second fact was that "Dark Arts" didn't have always an evil conception, some branches of Magic were called Dark not because they were bad in nature, but because they were to difficult to learn and even more risky to practice them, even _Avada Kadabra_ was developed for ancient healers, so they could bring a merciful death to the lost cases.

So, necromancy was a more accepted Branch in the past, it wasn´t seemed as evil per se, because even now the wish to know what is beyond death is something very human, the first Necromantic Rituals had the purpose to learn the knowledge of the dead, and the secrets that they had learned beyond the veil, the more religious wizards and muggles though that this was an unnatural power, and after the dark ages and the embrace of a Christian morality in most of the western societies Necromancy, and many other branches, were labeled as "Evil" and forbidden, but in other parts of the world there were places that even today studied Death as a natural part of magic, like some Tibetan monks and Native American Shamans.

Fortunately for Hermione, the Black´s library was well versed in these obscure themes, they had a very nice collection of very rare books, and if something was missing, the right number of galleons could get anything in Knockturn Alley without questions, now in perspective she felt silly thinking about the Horcrux Hunt, almost every answer they had needed then of their nature and how to destroy them had been at their reach, if only people weren´t so hardwired against dark arts the Second War surely would have been more easy, kill or be killed, that was the only true in war, and here she was with so much knowledge about defending yourself and killing your enemies in many painful and efficient ways.

But that wasn´t her objective, not for now, maybe in the future to protect herself and Harry once she got him back to life, and that was the biggest question, how to bring him back? Yes, She had learned how to reanimate his corpse (she got a nameless one from the local morgue, too easy with magic), even how to make him a new body like Voldemort had once done (and how to make silver limps like the hand of Wormtail too), she even had "talked" with the ghosts, or better said, the psychic remains of dead muggles in the graveyard even if they were mere shadows or reflections of whom they were while breathing and useless most of them, the difficult part was to bring Harry's soul back in one piece, necromancers talked about the risks to force a soul from the realm of the dead, in many cases Nature or God, Whatever pleased you, sought for some kind of equilibrium or payment, so in order to bring a soul back you had to give another one in exchange, and even then in most of cases the soul would arrive damaged, losing memories of who it was or in total state of madness.

She didn´t care about the sacrifices she would need to do, certainly there were people in this world that deserved to die, she would die if it was necessary, but she couldn´t risk to harm Harry in any form, after many nights thinking and formulating arithmancy theories to compensate the exchange she was exhausted, trying to rest and clear her mind she indulged in a new habit, losing herself into her recently acquired pensive living again and gain just one memory: Their dance in the Forest of Den, it was so intimate and close, so comforting not only because he tried to heal a very broken heart, but because it showed how much Harry cared for her… and suddenly the answer came clear as the stars in the night, Harry once talked about a stone lost long ago in another forest at the end of the war, a stone that let you summon anyone from the other side of the veil.

 **Don´t hate me, but you will have to wait a bit for the next chapter, but as always I hope you like this one, I have been trying to get into the mood that justifies Hermione's actions, the title I choose for the story has many meanings, maybe even a few I can see as the author, but I´ll share one of my personal interpretations: After you risk it all and make many sacrifices, can you see yourself in the mirror without thinking you changed? That the reflection on the other side is not you? Not like you remember you used to be? So for Hermione (in my story of course) can she tell she is the same as always?**


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